INGET NYTT UNDER SOLEN

Inget Nytt Under Solen is the only album I have heard by KAIPA and after a few listens I was a fan. The music would best be described as jazz influenced symphonic prog and there are many beautiful melodies as well as great riffs/progressions.

Roine Stolt on guitars produces some fantastic music here, it's mostly lead guitar work but it's very exciting, at times it's anthemic, at times triumphant, at times sombre and it times it's a freakout but it's always very interesting and engaging there is some great harmonised guitar work here too which was very intriguing (unfortunately unable to be reproduced on the live bonus tracks). Hans Lundin on synths and keys is the meat and potatoes of this recording his various synths are almost always present throughout the music and more often than not they are a focal point of the music, his performance here shines. To be honest the rythmn section isn't very noticable or prevalent but they are certainly competent and hold the band together well. The vocals are all in swedish (except the bonus live versions where they are in english) and are often fairly sparse but they are fairly good in their own right, I actually like the swedish sung versions better.

The 21 minute 44 second 'skenet bedrar' is the gem of this album and like all good prog epics it portrays recurring musical motifs in new and exciting ways and it navigates through much different emotional and atmospheric territory with great results.

'Inget nytt under solen' the title track is another fantastic song staring off upbeat and then falling into a meandering, spacey, sombre atmosphere - a very well written piece.

Unfortunately there are some very weak songs on this album 'omsun sken', 'stengrodornas parad' and 'dagens port' all seem like filler to me and nothing much really happens there which is what prevented me from giving this album 5 stars. The live tracks almost make up for it though.

Overall an album well worth investigating for fans of symphonic and scandanvian prog, similar to bands such as ANGLAGARD and ATLAS.